Carbon Offset Survey: After Certification, Price Is Critical Issue

Initial industry survey finds Carbonfund.org with best price and value

Washington, DC. March 20, 2006 - As more and more people are taking responsibility for offsetting their climate footprint by supporting renewable energy, energy efficiency and reforestation to reduce their emissions, Ecobusinesslinks.com, a leading web-based environmental information portal, has done the first comprehensive comparison of the nonprofit and for profit organizations providing carbon offsets.

“While more than a dozen organizations and companies are providing the services, what shocked us was the price discrepancy between groups basically providing the same level of environmental protection,” said Ecobusinesslinks.com editor Edgard Swinnen. “Each group offered a high-level of certification for their offering, suggesting consumers should really be looking at price as the determining criteria. Carbonfund.org clearly offers the most environmental protection per dollar,” he added.

Of the eleven organizations analyzed, five are based in the US, including Carbonfund.org, three in the UK, two in Australia and one in Switzerland.

At just $5.50 to offset a metric ton of carbon dioxide, the primary greenhouse gas causing climate change, not including the tax deduction American donors receive, Carbonfund.org was the clear leader in the study. Carbonfund.org supports certified wind energy, energy efficiency and reforestation projects, including a wind project on a Native American reservation in South Dakota. “Carbonfund.org also wins kudos for giving their supporters the choice of projects they want to support, providing an empowering customer experience,” said Swinnen. Carbonfund.org also provided the greatest range of offset types, including cars, home, air travel and national average.

“Carbonfund.org is dedicated to making it easy and affordable for anyone to reduce their climate footprint,” said Carbonfund.org President Lesley Marcus Carlson. “We are trying to offer the lowest cost pathway while giving our supporters the choice of where their money goes. If we are going to solve the massive global problem of climate change, which is getting worse with every passing day, we simply need millions of people engaged in the solution. On this issue, we can not afford to put profit ahead of our climate,” she added.

Several groups, such as UK-based Trees for Life ($20 per ton of CO2), support only reforestation projects, seeking to replenish the rain forests and other areas ravaged by old growth forest cutting. The more expensive groups, including Native Energy, are for profit companies that are specific to car travel or wind energy and cost substantially more than Carbonfund.org, which offers both services. Sustainable Travel International, another for profit, came in at a whopping $30 to offset one ton of CO2, nearly six times the low cost provider.

The study also suggests the future for carbon offsets looks bright as more and more people are seeking to do their part to stop climate change.

Carbon OffsetsCarbon offsets are the process of reducing a ton of carbon dioxide emissions in another location for the emissions you cause. While most people can reduce their climate footprints by using energy more efficiently and buying cars that get better gas mileage, cost-efficiently reducing it to zero through individual actions is nearly impossible. Carbon offsets are a cost effective way to reduce the remainder of one’s climate footprint.